Libs launch broadband poll

Australia's federal coalition has launched a "Broadband Test" that shadow Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull has told the ABC will help participants to understand the speed of the broadband service they receive.

The test, available here, was launched by Turnbull today and offers the following statement before users are offered the chance to answer questions:

The Coalition is committed to all Australians having access to very fast broadband and to providing the necessary upgrades as soon and as cost effectively as possible.

Our plan is to complete the construction of the National Broadband Network but to do so sooner, cheaper and more affordably for consumers.

A key element in our approach is to enable us to identify and prioritise those areas with the least adequate services.

This information will enable us to ensure that if we are elected to Government the roll out of the NBN can be accelerated and targeted at the communities which need upgrades most.

The information submitted in this survey will not be shared with third parties. Individual responses will not be published.

The test asks for participants' address, prompts users to state the applications they feel don't perform well enough on their current broadband connections and includes a speed test. It appears that the data collected is uploaded for analysis and will be used to develop an alternative to NBNCo's current plans, which Turnbull says are running late, over budget, and are likely to drift further in future.

Abundant evidence collected on other sites suggests otherwise.

There are also a couple of gotchas in the survey, including a question about whether participants feel BitTorrent works fast enough in their homes. The Reg suspects the resulting data may be used as political weapon in future. ®